


Wakanda

by TellMeNoAgain



Series: So Much Trouble [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Fix-It, Not Beta Read, Not even a crush yet, Power Imbalance, Pre-Slash, Slow Burn, Thanos (Marvel) Dies, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2019-12-05
Packaged: 2021-02-26 23:40:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21677536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TellMeNoAgain/pseuds/TellMeNoAgain
Summary: Read elsewhere in the series at your own risk.  This one is safe.  Peter makes the biggest decision of his superhero career, with a little help from friends.~~~“Fourteen million, six hundred and six,” agrees Tony.  “It’s always the second prototype.  Good science never stops at one.”Dr. Strange looks briefly enraged and then subsides, tilting his head at The Scarlet Witch and saying, “I’d appreciate a consultation at your convenience, madam.”  The Scarlet Witch inclines her head a bare inch and smiles enigmatically.  Vision hands her a starfruit and she makes a small noise of pleasure biting into it.It’s starting to dawn on Peter that they won.
Series: So Much Trouble [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1562707
Comments: 12
Kudos: 82





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Not beta read because I posted before I started making friends.
> 
> I don't think this one has any triggers, but let me know and I can add more tags and warnings.
> 
> NOT ENDGAME COMPLIANT. (Let's be real here, this AU is barely MCU compliant.)
> 
> For completionists, DEAD DOVE warning, this series is going to be D/s Starker.
> 
> For prudes, these are fictional characters and I've double checked, no one actually has a skeevy real-life relationship as a result of this series, so, like, relax.

Peter know the exact moment when Mr. Stark’s spaceship hits Earth’s atmosphere because his voice rings out from KAREN’s speaker, making Peter jump as he says sternly, “Peter Parker, you are in so much trouble, we  _ do not _ hitch rides from people who mess with the space-time fabric of the universe! I know we didn’t cover that at superhero school but that’s because  _ it’s obvious. _ ”

Peter thinks his cowl up and shouts, “Mr. Stark! You’re here!”

“How are you a certified genius,” scoffs Mr. Stark.

“We’re in Wakanda, everyone’s here,” Peter tells him, idiotically, like KAREN isn’t capable of telling Mr. Stark which exact centimeters Peter is standing on.

“Pepper first,” Mr. Stark tells him, “but you tell His Majesty to chill my water, Wakanda is five minutes after that.”

Peter nods, and then runs to find the Captain and let him know.

~~~

  
Mid-week later, over a truly amazing amount of food, Captain America attempts to do a debrief, and Mr. Stark, back from Titan, covered in bruises but looking so alive it hurts Peter’s eyes, is crowing, “A million to one that it would work but whoever made those gloves had a crack somewhere, deliberately flawed the damn glove or the bots couldn’t have gotten in, there’s no damn way, but it was worth the chance, it was worth it!”   
  
Thor flexes his hand around his weapon and say ruefully, “The dwarves are known for their cunning. Eitri most of all.”   
  
Tony does a double take and says, “Ooooh. Yes, I am meeting this dwarf, you are hooking us up, that’s my ‘I’m going to Disneyworld,’ I am meeting this guy and I am buying him a beer.”   
  
“Mead,” corrects the antenna chick, not pausing in her check of the space guy, Quinn or Quill or whatever, another Peter, apparently, going carefully over every inch of skin with a green wipe and some kind of sealant where there are cuts and busted open skin. “Dwarves like mead.”   
  
“Fucking Egon,” says the guy eliptically and Peter can tell he is barely holding it together, he looks wrecked.   
  
Even Tony sobers a little, looking at him.   
  
“So that’s how the gauntlet broke apart, nanobots you designed to take out Mjolnir” says Captain America, sounding disapproving. Peter can hear the _“We’ll talk about that later”_ in his tone. The Captain turns to Dr. Strange and asks, “How did you- one second Peter is out on Titan, and the next he’s here.”

“Well, I have to figure that part out yet,” admits Dr. Strange, sounding suddenly weary.    
  
“You had like a bracelet-cuff-thing,” offers Peter, his mouth full of some kind of fruit, it was amazing, he’d eaten six already, “Blue stone? On your wrist.”   
  
“Yes,” murmurs Wanda, tucked under Vision’s arm, eyes closed. “Yes, that would work, wouldn’t it. We can make that work. We can do it again, Dr. Strange.” And she opens her eyes slowly, and turns her head to stare at him, her gaze uncanny and quite honestly, freaking Peter out.   
  
“Two,” breathes Dr. Strange. “There are two.”

“Fourteen million, six hundred and _six_ ,” agrees Tony. “It’s always the second prototype. Good science never stops at one.”

Dr. Strange looks briefly enraged and then subsides, tilting his head at The Scarlet Witch and saying, “I’d appreciate a consultation at your convenience, madam.” 

The Scarlet Witch inclines her head a bare inch and smiles enigmatically. Vision hands her a starfruit and she makes a small noise of pleasure biting into it.

It’s starting to dawn on Peter that they won.

  
~~~

  
He hasn’t worn the cowl all week, he’s just one white man among many in Wakanda, notable but not, not _recognizable_ , Shuri’s friend, but he holds it in his hand now. Mr. Stark and Ms. Potts are making noises about having to return for the Accords, having to fix the Accords, and Peter had been there for the worst conversation ever, between Mr. Stark and Captain America, down in the lab late at night, too late at night, just two nights ago.    
  
He could tell they’d forgotten he was tucked up on the couch, dozing but not quite asleep. Banner was sprawled out over the other one and Shuri had retired to her rooms, declaring them all savages and announcing she was locking her station.   
  
Mr. Stark had said, “So the thing is, I saw Thanos, I saw all that destruction and more, when- with the nuclear warhead- with the fall- and I know they’re not ideal but nothing starts off perfect and I’ve been working, it’s politics, it’s not easy, but I’ve been killing myself to get somewhere, here, so that this- this doesn’t happen, so that we’re all on the same side, so we can do this together, next time, and I’d appreciate a little-”   
  
“Tony,” Captain America-call-me-Steve had interrupted, putting a hand up. “I can respect that.”   
  
Mr. Stark huffs, once, and then says, tentative, in a voice Peter, who has worked in the lab with him for hours and who has watched like every celebrity interview ever, has never heard, “Will you sign, then? Will you help me fix them? I can’t- I think- I mean, this mess, it clearly shows, I need-”   
  
And the other man grabs Mr. Stark by the back of the neck and knocks their heads together and says, “You have my shield.”   
  
And Mr. Stark bursts into laughter and rears back and says accusingly, “Who showed you that trilogy? Who did it? I was  _ saving _ it!”   
  
“Clint,” says the Captain, easily. 

Mr. Stark fiddles with something, Peter can’t tell what it is with his eyes closed but he can tell Mr. Stark isn’t actually doing anything with it, and says, with a growing smile that Peter can hear in his voice, “We’re getting the band back together.”   
  
The Captain nods, and says, “Hawkeye’s retired.”   
  
“He’ll come back for this. I swear it, he’ll be there,” promises Mr. Stark. “He wouldn’t miss it. I’m getting everyone brand new comforters for their beds. New jacuzzis. This is going to be edda-level of epic.”   
  
The Captain groans and says, “Oh Gods, did you hear Thor’s latest? It’s four hours long and fully two thirds is dedicated to that ax of his.”    
  
Anyway, that was two days ago, and now Peter’s sitting in this strange bed and holding his mask and he says in a voice that’s almost unrecognizable, it has so many tears filling it “KAREN?”   
  
“Yes, Peter?”   
  
“Call May.”


	2. Chapter 2

May and Peter talk for two hours, the pros and cons of taking the team up on their offer. What it boils down to is, Peter can’t keep Aunt May any safer, can’t keep MJ or Ned or even that asshole Flash safer, without the resources of the team, of SHIELD, behind him. Anonymity isn’t going to work, now, the media is already in a frenzy over the found footage of Spiderman leaping onto the spaceship, someone had cameras at the Battle of Wakanda, he’s an international person of interest. There are CCTV videos of him, back in Queens, he knows it, he tried to map them all but it’s 2018 and there are cameras everywhere, and someone is going to catch Peter Parker going into an alley and Spiderman webbing out, and whereas before, that would have been small potatoes, Spiderman just saved the earth from alien invaders and a video find like that would be a potato field.

“Peter,” says Aunt May, wiping tears from her eyes, “I want you to just be a normal kid, just, have a normal college life, you know?”   
  
He nods miserably. Part of him just wants that, too.    
  
“But I don’t think that’s on the menu today.”   
  
He shakes his head. They’ve been over it twice now, and if he doesn’t sign the Accords, he’s a fugitive, and the Daily Bugle’s hatred of him was nothing, not when Captain America is signing the Accords, when The Winter Soldier is signing them. Peter’s just some kid in a suit, really, and Mr. Stark is offering him that internship on a platter, skip college and get right to work, and Mr. Stark had laughed and said, “We’ll get you a Phoenix degree if the paperwork means so much to you. I think I own them.”

“I can’t make this decision for you,” she says sadly, reaching for the camera, and he knows she is trailing one finger across his digital face. “I want to be there so badly, you need a hug, I need to hug you.”   
  
He starts crying, again, and she does, too. “I- Aunt May- me too,” he whispers.   
  
“Okay, okay, Peter,” she wheezes, visibly pulling herself together. “Then go sign the Accords with your friends and I’ll meet you in Germany, and afterwards we are eating so many brownies and you are never leaving my sight, do you hear me? You are grounded to my  _ left side _ .”   
  
He nods and says, “I think Mr. Stark has a jet, I think I can ask him, you don’t have to buy a ticket, Aunt May.”   
  
She laughs and says, “Oh, hon, that is not even the beginning of what Mr. Stark and I are going to hammer out. You are seventeen for four more months and that makes you mine, and until August 26th at midnight, I am legally able to set your bedtime and tell Mr. Stark to follow it.”   
  
Peter laughs at that image and says, “Good luck, Aunt May.”   
  
Her face softens and she says, “You, too. Hold tight, Peter, I’m coming.”   
  
He nods and they say a few more nice things, she reminds him to brush his teeth and remember his manners with the king and former queen, and then he’s alone in his bedroom and while the future is terrifying, the bands around his chest have eased now that a decision has been made.   
  
He texts Mr. Stark,  _ Made the decision. Gonna sign. M says she needs to borrow a jet? _   
  
And it’s less than ten seconds later that he reads,  _ Welcome to the Avengers. What’s May’s favorite color? Something metallic, I hope _   
  
He types back,  _ Mr. Stark, you can’t redecorate a jet just for one flight,  _ even though he knows the man totally could.

_Who said redecorate, I’m an engineer, I build. She’s going to need it for more than 1 flight._  
  
Peter blows out his breath and says, “Too much,” and then thinks about it and types, _Too much._  
  
_Damn. On it, then. Gotta get back to this policy review, will put Pep in touch with May. TS out._   
  
Peter falls back on the bed for a moment, head spinning with this whole day. He thinks about his options- the Captain had offered to spar in the crazy gym, and Falcon had said something about hitting up the nearby canyons, but there’s only one person he really wants to see right now, for her boundless energy and optimism. He twists his Kimoyo beads and says, “Shuri,” and her face pops into view with a crow of delight.  
  
“Idiot man!” she squeals. “Come to my lab, I have done so much since yesterday!”  
  
He smiles and nods and she squeals again and demands, “And stop by the kitchens and grab me some stew, I am famished and the cooks will pity you for those tear tracks and probably throw in some mbash’a’a cookies early, I smelled them this morning but they are for the banquet tonight.”  
  
He huffs out a breath and says, “Fine, okay, but I’m washing my face when I get to the lab.”  
  
“Kitchens first!” she agrees. “Go now, I cannot wait!”  
  
Mbash’a’a cookies are worth the embarrassment of walking around the palace of beautiful and poised nobility looking like an absolute wreck. 


	3. Chapter 3

Later that night, before the reception for more Asguardian refugees and royalty, Ramonda slips into his rooms. He’s staring out the window, sitting on a soft chair, his feet on the railing, and she glides in, silently. When he turns, thinking it is a staff member coming to tell him some minor detail, he startles so hard he almost slips awkwardly, and it is only his spidersense that prevents a fall. “Y-your Majesty,” he gulps, feeling overwhelmingly guilty. He’d had his  _ feet _ on her  _ bannister. _   
  
She holds up a hand to forestall more words. “In one hour’s time, dear man, I will again be Her Majesty, Queen Mother of All Wakanda, but in this hour, I am only Ramonda, your friend Shuri’s mom. And I come to you with a heart heavy with concern.”   
  
He stands immediately and walks over to her, already wondering who is in trouble and how he- how Spiderman-can help. She pats the couch beside her and tilts her head.    
  
“You see, dear man, my daughter Shuri’s friend, you were seen this afternoon, in many halls and in the kitchen, in distress- or just past distress. And then my daughter Shuri came to me, speaking so quickly, of the things you face, alone, and her fears for you.”   
  
Peter feels his face heat up. Oh. It’s- it’s him she’s worried about. Well, that’s… nice, but- “I’m fine now, ma’am,” he says cautiously, perching on the bed to stop her hand from its rhythm of pat-pat-patpat. “I had a call with my aunt, we talked about- a lot of stuff, it was hard, but I’m fine, now. Shuri had me go to the kitchens like that, to, to get cookies, or I wouldn’t- she thought the cooks would give me the mbasha’a cookies if I looked pitiful enough...”

“You are a good friend to my Shuri,” she agrees, and it’s like they’re having two different conversations, thinks Peter. “You have, I think, proven that you are far more than willing to throw yourself against the heavens for your friends. In a warrior, this is an excellent trait, and one we see, time and again, in our best legends. My son is such a warrior, and a legend, too.”   
  
Peter nods agreement. This is so awkward.  _ What- what does she want? _ he thinks plaintively.   
  
She takes a second to gather herself, and then states, “There is a difference, I see, a schism, one of many, between Wakanda and the world, in this and in many things. My son stands as a warrior, yes, but not alone. He is surrounded by his family, and his friends, and his tribe, and then his people, all of his people, who remind him of his responsibilities-” And Peter can’t stop the flinch, nor the sudden flush in his skin- “And also of his joys. When I watch you, Peter Parker, I see a warrior who is a foreigner in a foreign land, and who is so bent beneath his responsibilities he has forgotten, perhaps, his joys. And I think to myself,  _ where is his family? Where are his friends? Is his tribe not proud of him? Where do they stand, if not beside him?  _ So, Peter Parker, tell me, who reminds you of your joys?”

For some reason, Peter thinks instantly of Mr. Stark, in the lab, dancing with Dum-E to his ancient rock anthems. And then he thinks of MJ and Ned, so far away, worlds away, who text him Spiderman memes and keep him up to date on all of the graduation gossip. Remembering Aunt May’s promise to ground him to her left hip makes him grit his teeth, and he says, “I have friends, but I’m- ma’am, Your Majesty- Ramonda-” he trips through his corrections- “I’m a fugitive. I haven’t signed the Accords.”  _ And Mr. Stark is very busy this week, _ a small voice says in the back of his skull. He ignores it.

“I know this, Peter Parker. But I am not blind. I know how to google on your internet. I have read of your deeds. You do not work on a team, you do not train with a team. Always, you are alone. You say, ‘Friendly, Neighborhood Spiderman,’ but you are far from your neighborhood and your friends, here.”   
  
Peter’s eyes sting. “No, I have- MJ and Ned- they’re, they’re my best friends, they, we do everything together, we cut class together last semester to go to the Stark Expo.”   
  
She folds her hands and mulls this for a second. “MJ and Ned. They will come here, then, and this Aunt May of which your Mr. Stark speaks,” she declares, then holds up a hand to forestall his scandalized protest of, “There’s- I don’t  _ need _ -”    
  
“I am not certain that the Accords will be ready in a week, as your Mr. Stark argues can- and must- be done. And you cannot maintain this internal balance, this heavy duty and responsibility, without an avenue to embrace joy and excitement. It wears on you.”   
  
“Shuri-” begins Peter, feeling defensive.   
  
She holds up a hand again and says, “Shuri is not going to be taken from you, my spider warrior. New friends are a joy, and fill life with excitement and possibility. I believe you are good for her, in the ways that I have watched her change and grow this past week. A warrior must maintain his balance, Peter Parker. And I have seen the others of your team, these Avengers, find balance and refuge; even my son’s White Wolf walks smoother through the world.”   
  
Peter is stung- the Winter Soldier is  _ actually crazy- _ and stutters, “I’m- I’m sorry- I don’t-”   
  
“Yes, it is this need to apologize that betrays you. What have you done, Peter Parker, worth so many apologies, when it is laid alongside all that you have done for others?” She waits, calm and composed, her face smooth and interested in his response.   
  
Peter has spent his whole life in science labs, not philosophy debates. “I don’t know,” he gives up, thinking of how he failed Uncle Ben. “I just don’t get things right. It’s not bad to apologize,” he informs her. “It’s good manners.”   
  
She looks at him and says, “And yet, when I offer you your friends and family, instead of embracing my generosity with joy and excitement, you protest that you do not deserve them.”   
  
He winces.

“A man does not need so many to stand beside him,” she says, finally, cautiously, “if the ones who stand beside him are strong, and true, and guide him to balance within so that he may bring balance without.” She nods, and rises. “You think on what I have said, Peter Parker. I will return tomorrow and we may talk again.”

Wait, she can’t just leave and like, arrange for MJ and Ned and Aunt May to drop everything and come to  _ Wakanda _ .   
  
“MJ and Ned, we’re- we’re graduating soon, in a week, so they can’t just- they’ve worked so hard, it’s like a big deal, in America, in the United States, graduation. So they can’t come, not until they are done with it, which, that would be weeks.” Peter swallows, and thinks of being in Wakanda for  _ weeks _ .

“Were you supposed to attend this graduation in the United States with them?” asks Ramonda with real interest.

“Ye-es,” says Peter.    
  
“Hm,” says Ramonda. “I will think on it. I will not contact them without your permission, Peter Parker. I will see you tomorrow night.”   
  
Peter sighs. “Yes, ma’am,” he says resignedly.

“It is hard for my Shuri to make friends that she does not fast outpace in wit and wisdom, Peter Parker,” says Ramonda quietly, her gaze calm and powerful on his face. “You are a gift to her, a joy and a gift, come to her tribe when she best needs to recenter herself in joy and excitement. I would see you similarly enriched by your time among us.”   
  
He shrugs because what does a boy from Queens even say to a statement like that? His aunt buys his jeans from  _ Goodwill _ , and every piece of clothing in his closet right now is hand-tailored. He is way out of his depth.   
  
“I have given you much to think about,” she says regretfully, and touches his shoulder with careful fingertips. “I cannot apologize for it, but I do wish for you to rest well tonight.”   
  
He nods again and mutters, “Thank you, Your Maj- ma’am.”   
  
She inclines her head and sweeps from the room.   
  
Why is his life  _ like this _ ?

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to pop into the comments with ideas about what Peter should see/do, who he should talk to while in Wakanda, it might spark a plotmonkey for me. I won't handle criticism well, unless you and I have a baseline understanding, so I guess keep that to yourself or tell a friend, whichever one you want to do. Thanks for reading!


End file.
